Threshold The Drinking Game #8

Who cares about Caul? There's a space cupcake shop nearby!

What a surprise! Threshold, DC's next attempt at a War Comic (science fiction but still their war comic!) only made it eight issues! Just like Men of War. And Just like G.I. Combat. Although this series was actually good while the other war comics were just awful. I'm glad DC keeps trying but they've got to figure out how to sell non-Batman comic books already. And I think I know how! Here's what you do, DC: kill off Batman. Just kill him off. Then hint around that Bruce Wayne is actually undercover as a different super hero in the DC Universe! And the cover of every comic book after killing off Batman should read, "Is this really Bruce Wayne?!" And then have Bruce Wayne in a Catwoman suit looking sexy or wearing Superman's cape and diving off of a building. People will go mad trying to figure out who is now Bruce Wayne!

Although what will actually happen is that all the Batman fans will simply stop reading and proclaim that DC sucks and has always sucked. So actually, I don't have any ideas about how to sell more comics. DC, I suppose your solution is as good as it gets: just put Batman and Superman in every single comic book.

Batman and Superman aren't in this comic book. So you can move along to one that does now. But I have to read it. It's, like, mandatory and shit.

Last issue I believed that Jediah Caul, Green Lantern, was teleported to Lady Styx for some diplomatic business. But instead he's ended up in the Office for Intergalactic Visas battling a mob of bureaucrats.

Uh oh. I'm pretty sure she's from HR. Or the equivalent since these aren't exactly humans.

You know, I only write these commentaries so I can reread them when a new issue of the comic comes up and catch up quickly on what was happening previously. But since this is the final issue of Threshold, I don't have to write a commentary about it! Yay! We should all just get drunk instead! Yay! Or eat a lot of cookies if you're not into getting drunk. I guess it depends on which you'd rather deal with: a hangover or twenty extra pounds? Fuck it! Let's get drunk AND eat cookies!

Let's just turn this comic book into a drinking game, okay? Let me make up some rules. How about twenty of them?

1. Whenever a character says "literally", you have to take a shot. If they use it correctly (very rare!), you get to eat a cookie instead!
2. Whenever a character defies another character (without violence), drink.
3. Whenever a character acts rationally and engages in normal conversation when confronted with defiance or potential violence, eat a cookie!
4. Drink every time somebody is punched or kicked or hit with a light construct.
5. Eat a cookie every time a light construct is used in a helpful manner, like to save lives or fix a tea pot.
6. Finish your drink whenever a character dies.
7. Eat a cookie every time Keith Giffen writes a meta-textual statement.
8. Drink after every time you turn a page.
9. Finish your drink if Captain K'rot's leg kidnapper is revealed.
10. Eat three cookies if Lonar calls his motorcycle, "Thunderer."
11. Drink whenever Batman makes an appearance.
12. Two drinks when Star Hawkins' robot assistant insults him.
13. Eat a cookie if Ember kisses somebody.
14. Finish your drink if The Hunted game show is cancelled.
15. Drink if Captain K'rot's Raccoon lady friend makes another appearance; eat a cookie of Captain K'rot's friend Pig Iron returns.
16. Drink and eat a cookie if Adonis is still alive.
17. Down three shots if Blue Beetle is returned to Earth.
18. Finish your drink if T'morra's bartender betrays the rebellion.
19. Eat a cookie every time Stealth is in a panel and not using her power.
20. Drink every time Stealth is in a panel and using her power. Finish a full beer if this never happens by the end of the comic.

I think I've covered most of what might happen! Now I'll just scan in the pictures which match one of the rules! Everybody ready? Let's go!

I'm calling five drinks on Page One due to violation of Rule #4! At least five bureaucrats are involved in the fracas with Jediah, so they're either pummeling or being pummeled.

Drink because we're turning to Page Two (Rule #8)! Oh man. I hope nobody decided to start out with Tequila because the first panel on Page Two is going to fuck you up.

Nine people hit with a light construct! Drink nine times thanks to Rule #4!

The next few panels are the ones I initially scanned. I think those call for eating a cookie because the Human Resources Manager calms the violence by being rational (Rule #3). It was about time to eat a cookie anyway!

Page Three sees quite a few violations of Rule #2 thanks to Caul acting like a typical Green Lantern and thinking nobody has any authority over them except maybe the stupid Oans.

Two drinks for two acts of defiance by Caul (Rule #2) and one drink for Lady HR's deescalation with her mind powers (Rule #3. I think mind powers can be considered being rational).

Turning to Page Four, so take a drink (Rule #8)! Oh, but first take a drink because of Batman's appearance on the inside cover (Rule #11). I almost missed that one!

Page Four has five panels with Stealth not using her powers, so eat five cookies (Rule #19)! And be sure to wash them down with a drink because we're turning to Page Five now (Rule #8). I'm not counting advertisements as story pages. But they will count for Batman appearances!.

Whoa. Page Five is a bit crazy. Let me scan it in and we'll tally up what happens and maybe make a couple of judgment calls.

Remember how I compared this place to Cheers last commentary? Well, it's time to break down the set!

Holy shit. This page alone makes it look like I already read this comic before making my rules because it's a fucking guzzlefest. First off, eat a cookie for the first panel's meta-text commentary on the cancellation (Rule #7)! Second, I think we can call this as the bartender betraying the Rebellion since she was working with The Hunted game show by running this Hunted Set so finish your drink (Rule #18). Now be sure to get another completely full drink and finish it because The Hunted game show has been cancelled (Rule #14). Eat one more cookie because Stealth appears on panel without using her power (Rule #19). I think that's everything! Be sure to get another drink ready because we're turning to Page Six now (Rule #8).

Don't listen to the Bartender/Actress! Rules are not made to be broken! Stop trying to skip eating cookies and drinking drinks just because you're getting slammed by this game!

Page Six gives us a bit of relief from drinking. But we do need to eat three cookies due to two appearances by Stealth (Rule #19) and one metatextual comment about "Mysteries in Space" (Rule #7). See, Mysteries in Space is another old DC Anthology Title which this guy is going to go star in. That wasn't meant to be patronizing for all y'all who already knew that. I just figured some people might be wondering why they were eating that third cookie! Although who really needs a fucking reason to eat a third cookie?

Take a drink because we're moving on to Page Seven (Rule #8)!

I think this counts as defiance! Rule #2! Drink up, bitches!

It's a good thing it's five in the morning and I couldn't purchase any alcohol before reading this or I might be on the floor by now puking up Oreos.

Turning to Page Eight, drink up (Rule #8)! This page turning rule is just one of those arbitrary rules in a drinking game that simply allows everybody to drink because why are you playing a drinking game if you don't want to drink at all anyway?

Caul gets his back healed by an Omnidoc on Page Eight so he doesn't have to use his Green Lantern Brace anymore. If he'd made that brace during this issue, it would have been time to eat a cookie thanks to Rule #5! As Caul is led by Lady HR to get some answers about why The Hunted is ending, they pass by a scene that deserves one cookie for Rule #7 (meta-textual commentary) and three shots for sending Blue Beetle home (Rule #17).

Oh. I think a drink is in store for Caul's defiance as well (Rule #2).

Drinkity drink up because we're turning to Page Ten (Rule #8)! Caul is led into the Office of the person running The Hunted: T'morra! I still think this allows for the full drink judgment call on his bartender earlier. They were just in it together is all!

Just to be on the safe side, I think we should chug an entire drink with a couple of cookies crumbled into it in honor of Rule #7, Meta-textual commentary, simply based on the overall premise of this entire issue!

Turning to Page Twelve, so chug-a-lug (Rule #8). Just a little bit! One tiny drink! So maybe I used chug-a-lug incorrectly. It's not like I was ever sober enough to learn proper usage in situations when people were using it! Anyway, get your drinks and cookies ready for more!

So this is where Blue Beetle actually returns. Don't worry, you don't have to drink again. Unless you want to!

I suppose we'll count the above panel as four drinks thanks to Rule #4 (Punching and shit!) and one cookie thanks to Rule #7 (meta-textual narrative concerning the reasons for introducing Lonar and Blue Beetle into the title). And another drink as I turn to Page Thirteen (Rule #8). You know, we wouldn't need to drink so much if the advertisements were placed more strategically.

Three drinks thanks to Rule #4 and two cookies thanks to Rules #3 and #7! And another drink as I'm going to be turning to Page Fourteen after this caption (Rule #8).

On Page Fourteen and Fifteen, Caul and T'morra simply discuss job offers. T'morra "offers" Caul a job starring in a new show about an inspirational hero that always tries to do the right thing. Caul, the soon-to-be actor, already understands the job of an actor fairly well when he realizes he's simply going to be a "walking, talking, propaganda-spewing shill." You should probably eat some cookies here due to Rule #7. I don't know how many. Whatever you feel comfortable with. And a drink as we turn to Page Sixteen (Rule #8).

Fuck it. Just eat all of your Goddamned cookies.

Rule #7 probably doesn't matter anymore since I told you to eat all of your cookies. But on Page Seventeen, T'morra mentions Space Cabby and how he's disappeared from everyone's memories.

If you've actually been playing the Threshold Drinking Game, you probably won't remember this. Or you'll simply assumed you hallucinated it.

Caul decides to join up and star in the show. He's put in costume and sent off to appear in the pilot episode. But it doesn't turn out quite like he expected.

Whoops! Rule #6! Finish your alcohol! Game over!

T'morra's big fake out was that Caul would get a Glimmernet show and everybody would make a ton of money. Instead, T'morra films Caul being murdered to establish the premise of his Glimmernet Show:

Fuck. I've scanned way too many pages of this thing. I'll have to do the back-up story scanless and with no drinking!

The back-up story reveals that Star Hawkins was the one to kill Caul when he suddenly materialized in front of a panicked Hawkins. So Hawkins is the guy T'morra is hunting in his new show! It outta be pretty exciting whenever it gets published in Super Pretend Imagination Land!

Threshold #8 Rating: +10 Drunkenness. So Men of War failed. G.I. Combat failed. Threshold failed. Is Mystery in Space next? Or maybe Ghosts? I'm kind of hoping for House of Secrets.

Threshold #6

Ember is certainly looking much better.

According to the cover, Ember's head injury wasn't as terminal as the six panels of her lying in the street bleeding out had lead me to believe. That's the last time I allow a comic book death to fool me! I should have realized that unlike Catwoman who is only human and thus definitely dead from her head wound, Ember is an alien that has learned to survive The Hunt and probably has some kind of tricky advanced technology capable of keeping her alive.

But before I find out why Ember is still alive, Jediah Caul has to make his way back to Tolerance. He's currently sitting on a space rock outside of Brainiac's Skull-Jellyfish Hybrid Space Ship feeling sorry for himself because he's about to head back into Tolerance and The Hunted to save whats-her-name. I don't know what her name is because I'm not sure who he's talking about. Stealth? I don't think he's met Stealth yet. Ember? She's dead! But he is with her on the cover! So maybe her! My Raccoon/Kitten Hybrid Alien Crush whose name I've forgotten? Maybe Kit Kat? Was her name Kit Kat? One thing he's definitely not doing is considering rescuing Captain K'rot. Screw that guy!

Oh yeah. He means Ilda, Star Hawkins robot assistant with his ex-wife's personality. I think this comic book has too many characters for my feeble mind to remember them all. Maybe more alcohol would help!

Maybe if I ate breakfast more often, my memory would be better. I seem to remember a commercial where a bunch of kids spun around in circles and then fell over because they weren't eating their breakfasts. So maybe breakfast just helps with spinning around in circles. Boy, if my memory were better maybe I could remember how to make my memory better. Stupid memory. You're a failure!

One thing I do remember is that I kept calling Brainiac "Gigantic Penis" last issue for some reason!

Oh yeah! That was the reason! I guess Ilda and I think alike.

Jediah Caul returns to threaten Brainiac while Ilda has him under her control. But her control doesn't last long enough and Brainiac comes back, breaks Jediah's back paralyzing him from the neck down, and ejects Caul and the Tolerance Collection into space. I guess Tolerance wasn't worth much because what kind of a collector voluntarily gives up a piece of their collection? I've traded Magic the Gathering Cards with people before and they're ruthless bastards! Although I shouldn't say that about all of them. When I first began playing Magic the Gathering, my girlfriend and I were looking through our cards at a laundromat in Santa Clara. Now this was just after The Dark set had been released but we didn't know anything about how Magic sold cards in new sets and new releases. We just had starter decks. Some guy from Santa Clara University was there and saw us and broke out his Magic cards. He realized we were new to the game and was excited to share in our new found wonder of this weird ass game. You need to realize this was, shit, twenty years ago? Something like that. Magic was an odd little new type of game. Now CCGs are fucking everywhere but this was a new and fascinating concept back then. This guy gave us both a Maze of Ith which was pretty generous considering that it was the only Maze of Ith I ever owned even after buying many, many The Dark packs.

Actually that story was a lie! I've never played that nerdy game ever! I also never spent $20 on an Argivian Archaeologist card nor do I even know if that's a thing or not!

Meanwhile on Tolerance, T'morra is speaking with whoever Ember really is via some kind of communication device. Ember was supposed to be keeping an eye on Stealth instead of scaring the shit out of her by getting herself shot in the head while trying to befriend her. Unless T'morra isn't using a communication device at all and Ember is actually the tree inside his headquarters. T'morra tells Ember to respawn and go recover Stealth.

T'morra's conversation is interrupted by Ric Starr, SPACE RANGER! Was every science fiction hero of the Silver Age named Star? I know my proof of theory only includes two people, Ric Starr and Star Hawkins, but isn't that enough? Ric is visiting to inform T'morra that Lonar the New God has joined forces with Blue Beetle.

Oh yeah. Ember is the tree.

And then Jediah Caul returns to Tolerance, destroying Ebon Guard ships live on Glimmernet. Stealth sees the reaction of Tolerance's citizens as they cheer the revolutionary underdog. Or maybe they just like seeing Green Lanterns make things with their green light. Whatever the reason, they're happy and on Caul's side. Stealth begins to believe that T'morra might be right about turning the people against The Hunted program. Lonar and Blue Beetle are also watching Caul's return to Tolerance while working out their own deal.

So will Blue Beetle be done after Threshold? Cured of his parasite? Nah. I bet he simply ends up on the Teen Titans.

Lastly, Star Hawkins sits depressed and drinking in his office having lost Ilda again. Brainiac deleted her before breaking Caul's back although Hawkins doesn't know that part of it. He just knows she never came back from her mission with Jediah Caul. But that's okay because he keeps a back-up flash drive of her personality! He just needs a new robot body for her.

And speaking of Star Hawkins, it looks like he's the back-up feature for this issue! That's good since the cover mentioned he would be. But this is DC Comics and you really can't put your faith in the veracity of the cover. You just pay your money and hope at least the title was right. And in some cases, like Aquaman, even that seems suspect when Aquaman barely even appears in the issue.

Case in point! The cover mentions Kolins as an artist in the issue but he was doing the Larfleeze back-up. The artists of the Star Hawkins back-up are Timothy Green II and Joseph Silver. Green and Silver! It's like a superhero team!

Star Hawkins has been hired by T'morra to find the Legendary First Hunted that has evaded capture since the game began. Turns out she's the woman behind The Crimson Thrust, the best Hunt Club on Tolerance. I suppose that's one way to keep from being captured. And The Crimson Thrust are ready to take Hawkins and Ilda's head to meet her.

Giffen is at his best when he's one or two degrees away from writing Ambush Bug.

Threshold #6 Rating: No change. I actually thought that Threshold would be the comic book that broke the trend of DC's "War Books" getting cancelled immediately. This isn't technically a war book even though it replaced G.I. Combat which replaced Men of War. Those two titles sucked and deserved to be canceled. I felt they took war too seriously which is exactly what a war comic doesn't need to do. They need to take the characters seriously, maybe exaggerate them a bit as fighting men, but then don't put them in normal war situations or modern terrorist battles. Men of War was almost good when they had a moment with Sgt. Rock meeting a super hero, but then it collapsed back into poorly sequenced battles and mundane battle scenes. Then, again, it almost got interesting when Sgt. Rock Junior encountered a group of seeming immortals, greats from battles across time. But there was no follow through and the story didn't go anywhere. G.I. Combat decided to bring back The War Wheel and The Haunted Tank, so it seemed to be trying to play up the outrageous World War II stories. But Nazis are over and done with. They can't continuously be the villainous specters of war until the end of time. I'm pretty sure they keep coming back as the inevitable enemy because they had great uniforms. They really popped!

I think I was going somewhere with this. Oh yeah! Threshold seemed like the non-war war book that could work. It's science fiction and set in deep space, so it was removed enough from the idea of real war to be fun. It has so many different characters that I can't remember them all but most of them (when I know who they are) have an interesting, individual story to tell. This is a book that could have run for a long time. I actually feel the least interesting character though is Jediah Caul, the main character. That might have hurt the book a bit. Maybe they should have lead with his becoming a Green Lantern because that was my favorite bit with him so far. He shot a Green Lantern in the head and the ring popped off the Lantern's finger and chose Caul as the successor. That's got to fuck you up a bit.

And what's going to happen to Captain K'rot? I hope we find out who took his leg before this comic is completely over.

Threshold #1

Caul has yellow skin. Were yellow skinned aliens unrecruitable back when the Power Ring had the color yellow defect?

I don't see a yellow Green Lantern in the 1985 Who's Who entry on the Corps. Although the cover shows a bunch of Green Lantern's being defeated by Golden Glider's blonde hair. Worst cosmic guardians ever.

Let's talk about Threshold. Excuse me. Let me monologue about Threshold while you skim this part looking for the main plot points and juicy details and then completely ignore the comment section at the bottom of this post. I was pleased to hear that a science fiction based comic was DC's next attempt at the anthology war book. Keith Giffen writing is just a bonus. I expect it to be funny. I expect it to piss off the creator of Captain Carrot (with good reason, probably. Fucking monolithic comic book entertainment corporations!). I expect Blue Beetle to guest star if he isn't too busy joining the Teen Titans. I probably expect too much. Maybe I should just read it.

For those people that aren't forcing themselves to purchase every single DC Comic Book with "The New 52" on the cover so they didn't bother picking up the New Guardians Annual, here's a synopsis of the game show, The Hunted:

Who is this lovely lady alien? Or male alien. Perhaps hermaphroditic alien.

The issue begins with Jediah Caul, renegade Green Lantern, wandering through a crowded section of Tolerance when the go ahead to begin trying to murder him flashes up on a giant screen directly behind him. Everybody pulls out their lasers and begins hunting. Since his Green Lantern Ring has been locked down by some fascist device, he'll probably be killed in a few pages. Unless Stealth can come to his rescue!

Who's Stealth? I don't know but she's on the cover!

This person with the awkward spread eagle double kick attack is Ember. She's annoying.

Ember leads Jediah to the sewers where they can hide. She's apparently one of The Hunted that's been on the run for awhile using the Disguise Tech to remain safe. She and some other Hunted have organized and have safe zones they call Blind Points where the "smart dust" used for transmitting live feeds has been cleared away. She was trying to recruit the ex-Green Lantern to their cause but he ditches her once she saves him to go pout.

Meanwhile, Stealth is establishing her identity with Ric Starr, Space Ranger!

We'll learn more about Ric Starr in my next Who's Who entry!

Both Ric Starr and Stealth are being Hunted. With Stealth having been listed as M.I.A., it looks like both her and the Space Ranger are prisoners of war against Lady Styx. And by prisoners I mean contestants. And there are a lot of contestants currently playing the game!

These citizens are horrible at The Hunted. I thought Crimson Thrust were supposed to be amazing at this show.

Ric Starr lets Stealth know about the organized contestants and tries to bring her to their side as well. But she just wants to know how he found her. Ric tells her he didn't find her.

Oh, there they are! Go Crimson Thrust! What kind of name is that? I think it's slang on the level of Dirty Sanchez or Angry Dragon.

The parts of this issue featuring Caul were a bit flat. I think the scenes were meant to be carried by Ember and her perky, sassy attitude but I found her annoying in that "Giffen is off his mark on his banter" kind of way. But I liked the scenes with Stealth and Ric Starr. So I'm a little bit above neutral on this comic right now. I'd definitely pick up Issue #2 but I'd still be weighing whether it would make the pull list. You know, if I wasn't forced to buy it due to my obsessive blogging.

Based on only the second page of the Larfleeze back-up story, I want a full sized Larfleeze comic book.

There's a lot of fun stuff here but I think my favorite bit is Metron's chair. Or maybe Sayd's corpse? The Tardis? Mjolnir?

Larfleeze is writing a book about himself when he learns of another Orange Lantern and flies off in a rage, leaving his Orange Power Battery behind. He soon learns the report was a hoax and returns to Okaara.

Only to find he's been completely cleaned out. All of his awesome shit is gone.

Threshold #1 Rating: I'll arbitrarily begin this comic book at Rank #26. So there.